Child advanced but too young for classes

[JWSJ]

My ds6 (7 in April) swallows science whole. He loves it so much that he doesn't realize he is absorbing so much. We've burned through the normal biology goals and are halfway through Earth science/astronomy. He will finish the normal material in a month. He is on 3rd grade math.

 

He has attended the local museums for biology classes, but he goes into the classes knowing the material already.

 

I would like to sign him up for more advanced biology classes (3rd grade) but there is a minimum age of 9yo. There is some simple field work he'd love to do. He can do the work and was not happy to hear he has to wait two years. I don't want to just drop science for a few months/years - I'm afraid he'll become disgruntled about the lack of resources and won't come back to it.

 

What have others done to accommodate such an accelerating child?

[Capt_Uhura]

I don't follow the WTM guide for science. I follow DS's interest. We've done Real Science 4kids pre-level I chemistry. We've also done several physics kits - magnetism, electricity, Newton's laws etc. Right now we're into LEGO MINDSTORMS robotics. We've done quite a bit w/ LEGOs and studying simple machines and physical forces. I've run into the same age restriction. I hate the age/grade mentality. Why can't they use them as a guideline and give these kids a chance?

[Beth in Central TX]

Is it possible for you to be in class with him? If you go to the instructor, explain the situation, and let them know that you will be there too, they might let him in the class. Once the museum instructor sees that your son can sit in class and keep up with the material, he might be more inclined to waive the requirement for him in future classes.

[JennW in SoCal]

When my ds's were young, class age restrictions frustrated me too, because the "age appropriate" classes were always far too simple. On the other hand, my now older boys have been frustrated when they are in a class that has a gifted younger student because the student often doesn't have the maturity (or a parent enforcing some basic discipline) to act appropriately in the class. Too often what they have experienced is the young gifted students often dominate all discussion, spouting off all the facts he or she knows.

 

I'm not at all implying that your child would be like this, but it has happened enough that we are now happy to see age limits imposed in some classes.

 

I find the majority of museum classes to be a waste because they tend to stick rigidly to the state education standards, meaning only 3rd graders can take classes about planets, for instance, and they expect very little from their students. Instead, my young kids and I would attend the adult classes together, and my kids behaved well and earned the respect of the museum staff. My oldest, in fact, was invited to work at the dinosaur exhibits when he was 8 years old because of his vast wealth of knowledge about dinosaurs and because of how well he behaved.

 

Our other positive experiences were the homeschool science co-ops and clubs that we did when the kids were early elementary. Those are generally set up for a wide age range, and parents can sit in to help monitor behavior (though there's always a mom or 2 who have very different viewpoints on proper behavior!)

 

So, follow your child's lead, get every possible science book and video, on whatever topic interests him. Get lots of science kits, go on nature walks, keep a nature journal -- that's basically the same as a biology field study. Keep looking at class offerings, but choose those classes carefully. Offer to be in the class with him, if need be.

 

Hope this helps!

[Nan in Mass]

Using Creepy Crawlers and the Scientific Method, I taught my son how to design an experiment and write it up, and I taught him how to use nature guides and keep a nature journal. Then we did tons of natural history while he made up his own experiments in all kinds of other things. We worked on getting our ham radio licenses, became volunteers at Audubon (plenty of field work opportunities there), did Lego Robotix, did the chemistry book recommended in TWTM (Fun with Atoms and Molecules? I learned more from it than I did in my college chem class and it was totally hands-on), did some archaeology, used a telescope (there are nice books that tell you what to do with one), watched Novas, built catapults and other things associated with our history, measured the height of trees, tidepooled, worked on weather, tracked hurricanes, checked out vernal pools, ... His older brother certified a vernal pool and he was involved in that. I got stacks of library books out of the children's science section and he read them. I just let him BE a scientist until he had enough math to do Singapore's Interactive Science and this year Conceptual Physics. We tried a few outside programs but we never managed to get the level right. People have recommended Prentice Hall's Explorer texts, too. My sister is using these with 7th and 8th graders (not accelerated), and in general she says she likes them, but occasionally they are frustrating because they simplify things, obviously, and sometimes they do it so much that the science breaks down, a problem for very bright children.

 

I vote you teach him how to keep a lab notebook and design an experiment, get him lots of library books to give him ideas, and let him play with that for a few more years until the program levels catch up to him.

 

HTH

-Nan

[KAR120C]

Honestly even the ones aimed at 9 year olds aren't really challenging, and for all the work of getting him in, the payoff has been seriously disappointing. Especially the Saturday class type activities and the summer camps are more often used as daycare and the crafts over-run the science.

 

I have successfully signed up for non-class activities, where the content was really REALLY high (like community hobby groups -- astronomy clubs and geology hikes and whatnot), offering the promise of my sticking to him like glue and yanking him out if his behavior was the least bit disruptive (including excessive questions -- he and I had a long talk about asking me first because there was a lot to cover and if I knew the answer he didn't have to take everyone's time on that). Those were really worth the effort and we didn't have any trouble getting in under those stipulations -- in fact we were invariably invited back for future events and the adults were thrilled to have a truly interested child who would hang on their every word about whatever the topic of the day was.

 

I've also been on the other end of it all... Kids who knew their stuff but really couldn't behave appropriately for the setting, or who really didn't know their stuff at all or didn't want to be there, and parents who wanted to change the setting to suit the kid when there were nineteen other kids for whom the original plan was just fine thank you. That didn't work, and I'm afraid those of us who have organized things for groups have been burned by "that" kind of parent enough times that we're shy of all parents bearing advanced kids -- even if we have our own!

 

So my other advice would be jump in and organize something yourself, and pick who you invite. We have a dissection/ biology club with three other kids, and on the surface of it they're all four WAY too young for that kind of thing but honestly? these particular kids are just right for it. They're pretty evenly matched for maturity and interest, and I can aim our projects right at their level on both. Even in a group of high school students picked by age alone, we would have some less mature (that I wouldn't give a scalpel to in a million years!) and many less interested. So I couldn't really drop DS into even a high school group for dissection and get the same results we get with our club of selected 7 and 8 year olds.

 

Sometimes you can get a local high school teacher who might like a little extra income over the summer to lead an event or two (like field trips), or maybe a college student who wants to play technical advisor in their field of study while you deal with lesson planning and pacing and the "teacher" stuff. And some interesting places will do field trips/tours for small groups where you get an expert from their staff to answer questions while parents deal with crowd control. Thinking outside a "class" setting can really open up a lot of options!! :)

[Jenny in Florida]

First of all, as someone else said, we have found that enrolling our kids in museum-type classes with their age peers is a total waste. The material is of no interest, and the behavior of the other kids is appalling. So, we gave up on any academic classes that have strict age limits. It's just not worth the trouble.

 

With that said, each of my two kids has participated in a couple of these types of classes, when I have been able to negotiate appropriate placement. In one case, for example, the local science museum allowed me to enroll my then-five-year-old son in the 1st-3rd grade class, with the provision that I stay with him and help him as necessary. That came about because I called the museum to ask if they were offering anything for my son's age group. They put me in touch with the teacher, who offered to let us come and visit her class. She observed my son and then said he'd be welcome to give it a try. It ended up working out really well for everyone, because my son got to take the class, and the teacher got me as an unpaid aide. (There were several older kids who needed more help than my son.)

 

The other thing that has worked out is to search out learning opportunities that are open to a wide range of ages, rather than "classes." For example, my daughter was welcomed with open arms into the local anthropology club at age 8 and participated happily there for several years. She was the only child in the group.

 

Currently, my now-9-year-old son is back taking classes at the science center. However, the classes are grouped by grade, rather than age, with three grades clustered in each class. And the organizers have been completely open to having kids enrolled in whichever grade the parents feel is appropriate. So, my son (fourth grade by age) is enrolled as a sixth grader and grouped in the sixth-eighth grade class. Even so, he rarely "learns" anything we haven't already covered at home. But he enjoys the classes because he likes the hands-on activities and the time spent with other kids.

 

--Jenny